TagFS — Tag Semantics for Hierarchical File Systems

Today, most computer users work with traditional hierarchical file systems for organizing large amounts of personal files. Recently, tagging has grown popular as an alternative means of organizing information resources, especially in collaborative contexts. This paper analyzes the different semantics between strictly hierarchical and tagging-based organisation. Based on these observations, we map non-hierarchical tagging and query semantics to the commonly used hierarchical file system semantics, thus combining the benefits of both worlds. Our WebDAV-based implementation allows users to collaboratively manage their files in a tag-based manner via existing, familiar file system explorers.